‘My first visit to Egypt.’ The dark-haired woman was wearing a cool cheesecloth skirt and blouse of brilliant contrasting blues and greens.
‘Mine too.’ Anna nodded. ‘You’re a friend of Charley’s, I gather?’
Serena laughed. ‘For my sins. We’re sort of flatmates in London. Well, in fact she rents a room in my flat. It was my idea to come out to Egypt and before I knew it Charley was coming too. She knew how long I’d wanted to come out here and I suppose I was so enthusiastic and excited I sold her the idea.’ She shook her head ruefully. ‘She and Andy had been going out together on and off for several months and when he heard about it he half jokingly said he’d come as well. Charley was over the moon and he realised he might have committed himself a bit more seriously than he intended so he asked the Booths and there we were, a veritable wagon train!’ She sighed. ‘I’m sorry. Does that sound as though I’m complaining?’
Anna shook her head. ‘I should think it’s more fun coming with friends than on your own.’
‘Perhaps.’ Serena did not sound too certain. There was a moment of silence as the driver climbed into his seat and leant forward to turn on the ignition. The bus gave a shudder and settled down into a violent but steady rattle. ‘You’re on your own?’ Serena’s enquiry was almost lost in the noise of grinding gears.
‘Newly divorced and stepping out for independence.’ Anna had a feeling that her jaunty tone had a wistful ring to it. She hoped not.
‘Good for you.’ Serena nodded. ‘My partner died four years ago. For a while it was like losing half of my own body. We had been so close there was a physical loss; part of me had died with him. But it gets better.’ She gave a big smile. ‘Sorry. That’s a bit intense for a first conversation, but at least you know there’s someone who understands if you need a chat.’
‘Thank you.’ Anna was astonished by the wave of warmth she felt for the other woman. It wasn’t the same, of course. Felix wasn’t dead. And her feelings for him – had they ever been so intense that she had felt him to be part of her? She wasn’t sure they had ever been that close.
Conversation was impossible above the noise of the engine and they turned their attention to the passing countryside. Apart from the cars and buses the landscape was, Anna realised, exactly as Louisa had described it a hundred and forty years before. And, with its intense air of timelessness, it might for all she knew have been the same fourteen hundred years before as well.
She stared out of her window at the intense green of this narrow strip of fertile fields, watered by narrow canals, and at the shade of the eucalyptus trees and palms which formed darker patches on the dusty road. She caught glimpses of water buffalo and donkeys and even camels; of men dressed in galabiyyas, boys dressed in jeans and some on bicycles, but most perched on the rumps of small trotting donkeys, whose ribs stuck out like harp strings. And there too were the fields of sugar cane and small allotment-like squares of onion and cabbages. Amongst them were scattered small, shabby papyrus and alabaster factories.
They stopped briefly to get out of the bus and photograph the Colossi of Memnon, two massive figures carved out of pink quartzite, standing alone on the bare rubbled ground, then they were back into the coach and heading once again towards the edge of the green fertile countryside. At last they were nearing the range of mountains she had seen from the boat in the early morning light. As they drew closer they changed colour. They were becoming less brown, less pink, more dazzling as the sun reflected off the dusty stone and the sand. They passed villages nestling into the cliffs with dark holes amongst the mud-brick houses which could have been modern or ancient, caves or dwellings or antiquities.
It was hard to tell, Anna realised, if something was two years old or two thousand. Here there was no green to be seen at all. The ground was everywhere a rubble of rocks and shale and scree.
The bus park in the valley dispelled all her visions of Louisa’s lonely visit to the tombs. As Andy had warned it was packed. Acres of coaches, hundreds of tourists and round them, like wasps round a jam pot, dozens and dozens of eager noisy men, dressed in colourful galabiyyas and headscarves, holding out postcards and statuettes of Bast, Tut and souvenirs galore.
‘Ignore them and follow me.’ Omar clapped his hands. ‘I will buy your tickets and photograph permits then you can explore alone or stay with me and I will take you into some of the tombs.’
Anna looked around in dismay. It was nothing like the place she had imagined. Nothing at all. For a moment she stood still, overwhelmed, then she was swept into a loosely gathered queue making its way alongside the barren cliffs, past a line of colourful booths and stalls where yet more souvenirs were being hawked. Andy and Charley, and Serena had disappeared. For a moment she wondered if she should try to find them, then she decided against it. With a smile she took her ticket from Omar and resolutely she set off to find her way around on her own.
The narrow valley absorbed the sunlight, turning it into a blinding oven. The mountains all around them were huge, ochre-coloured, awesome, rugged and uneven and deeply fissured. It was a landscape utterly untouched by time. The square entrances to the tombs were black enticing shadows scattered over the cliff faces. Some were barred with gates. Many were open.
‘You look bemused, Anna, love.’ Ben Forbes was beside her suddenly. ‘Want to venture in with me?’ His broad-brimmed hat flopped idiosyncratically to one side and the green canvas bag hanging from his left shoulder looked as though it had seen quite a few expeditions in the past. He had his guidebook already open. ‘Rameses IX. This is a particularly splendid tomb, I believe. It is as good a place as any to start.’ He led the way down a sloping ramp where they joined the queue of people wanting to go in.
‘Interesting man, Andy Watson. We were both a bit late applying for places on this holiday and as fate would have it there was only a double cabin left so we’re sharing. I don’t find him irresistible, but I can see the ladies might.’ He had taken off his glasses and was polishing them with his handkerchief.
‘Yes.’ She nodded.
‘Seems to have taken quite a shine to you.’
‘Oh, I don’t think so. He’s just being friendly.’
Ben nodded. ‘Probably.’ There was a moment’s silence as they shuffled forward in the queue. ‘I sat next to Charley on the bus.’
Anna glanced at him. ‘His girlfriend?’
‘According to her, yes. Forgive me poking my nose in, Anna, especially at this early stage, but I’ve been on cruises before and ours is an exceptionally small boat.’
Anna raised an eyebrow. ‘Am I being warned off?’
‘I think the lady could turn a bit nasty, if provoked.’
Sighing, Anna shrugged. ‘Isn’t it a shame when one can’t just be friends with someone of the opposite sex? I don’t want to get in anyone’s way. He was friendly. I don’t know anyone. That’s all.’
‘You know me.’ Ben gave her a warm smile, his eyes crinkling into deep folds at the corners. ‘Not so attractive, I grant you. Not so young. But infinitely less dangerous. Come on.’ He touched her elbow lightly.
They were in front of a large square entrance, the heavily barred gate standing open but overseen by watchful guards, who solemnly took their tickets, tore off one corner and returned them to each tourist. Slowly, shoulder to shoulder with people of every nationality, they shuffled down the long slope into the darkness, staring at the walls on either side of them, and at the ceiling over their heads. Every available surface area was covered from top to bottom in hieroglyphics and in pictures of pharaohs and gods – the overwhelming colours ochre and lemon yellow, green, lapis and aquamarine and black and white, stunningly preserved and covered now in plexiglass. She couldn’t take her eyes off them. So many books, so many pictures – ever since she was a child she had seen them, as everyone has, but never had she realised the overwhelming beauty and power they would present, or the sheer scale of them. To her amazement she found she could ignore the people milling round her, ign
ore the shouts and excited talk, the high-pitched competitive commentaries of the guides, the laughter, the irritations of people who, having come so far, to this wonderful, awesome place, proceeded to gossip and talk amongst themselves, seemingly oblivious to the beauty and history around them. The incredible silence was overwhelming. It drowned out the noise. It was all encompassing.
The further they walked into the tomb, the hotter it got. Used to British and European caves, which grow colder as you penetrate further in, Anna found it a shock. The darkness did not give respite. The silence and heat grew more and more dense.
On they moved, through three successive corridors, towards a huge pillared hall and then, at last into the burial chamber itself, with nothing but a rectangular pit to show where the sarcophagus would have been.
Ben glanced down at Anna. ‘Well, what do you think?’
She shook her head, ‘I’m speechless.’
He laughed. ‘Not an affliction which seems to affect many people down here.’ Slowly they turned and started making their way back towards the daylight. ‘What about going to see Tutankhamen’s tomb next? He’s back in there, you know, minus his treasure, of course.’ As they came out once more into the sunlight, he gestured towards one of the smaller entrances. ‘We’re lucky. I think they close his tomb every so often to give it a rest from all the visitors who come here. According to my guidebook it’s small and relatively low key compared with some of the others, because he died young and no one was expecting his death. He might even have been murdered.’
Once more they queued, once more a corner was removed from their ticket and slowly they made their way into the darkness. This tomb was indeed very different from the last one they had seen. Besides being smaller, it was simpler; there was no decoration, but there was something else. Anna stopped, allowing the people around her to pass on, unnoticed. Staring round she let her eyes become accustomed to the low level of lighting. Ben had moved on and for a moment she was alone. Then she realised what it was that was so strange. This tomb was cold.
She shivered, conscious of the goosepimples on her bare arms. ‘Ben?’ She couldn’t see him. A crowd of visitors were making their way into the inner chamber. She turned round, half expecting to find someone standing behind her. There was no one there. ‘Ben?’ Her voice was muffled in the silence.
Confused, she put her hand to her head, conscious suddenly of a group of tourists speaking Italian loudly, happily, as they filled the entrance behind her; in a moment they were all around her and she found herself being swept on in their wake.
She frowned. The tomb was no longer cold; it was as hot as the other they had visited and she could hardly breath. Suddenly panic-stricken, she pushed her way forward. She still couldn’t see Ben. She wasn’t usually claustrophobic, but the walls seemed to be closing in on her.
The people near her were anonymous black shadows, faceless in the dark. Her mouth had gone dry.
She stared round frantically and diving for the next entrance she abruptly found herself standing in the burial chamber itself, looking down at the open eyes of the young king Tutankhamen. He lay gazing up at the ceiling of his dark, hot tomb, disdaining the presence of the peasants who had come to stare at him, divested of the riches which had bolstered his royalty, but still he was awe-inspiring. How many of the people standing round him, she wondered, were as suddenly and as intensely aware as she was of the emaciated, broken body of the young king, lying inside that gilded wooden coffin? She shivered again, but this time not with cold.
‘Anna?’ Ben appeared beside her, his camera in his hand. ‘Isn’t he amazing?’
She nodded. The bag on her shoulder had grown very heavy. Why had she not taken out her own camera? She swung the soft leather holdall to the floor and was pulling open the zip when a strange wave of dizziness hit her. With a gasp, she straightened, leaving the bag to subside into the dust at her feet, spilling its contents over the ground.
‘Are you OK?’ Ben had caught sight of her out of the corner of his eye. He stooped, and hastily began pushing everything back into the bag for her. She saw a flash of scarlet as the silk-wrapped scent bottle was scooped out of sight, then his arm was round her shoulders.
‘I felt weird suddenly.’ She pressed her hands to her face. ‘I’m all right. I must have bent over too quickly to get my camera. Too much excitement, and too early a start, I expect.’ She forced herself to smile.
‘Perhaps that is a sign that it’s time to go and have a rest up in the fresh air.’ He took her arm, glancing over his shoulder. ‘These tombs are a bit overpowering, to my mind.’
‘There’s something down here, isn’t there?’ Anna could feel the perspiration on her back icing over. She was shivering again. ‘I thought all that business about the “curse of the mummy’s tomb” was rubbish, but there is an atmosphere. I don’t like it.’
A shout of laughter near her from a party of Germans, and the earnest mumble from a group of Japanese photographers in the treasury beyond the burial chamber, seemed to contradict her words, but it made no difference. ‘I do want to leave. I’m sorry.’
‘No problem. Come on.’
Grateful for the strength of his arm she stumbled after him, back towards the entrance corridor and the blinding sunlight outside.
Once sitting in the shade of the visitors’ resting area, she felt better. They both drank some bottled water, but she could see Ben was longing to move on. ‘Go without me, please. I will be all right soon. I shall just sit for a few minutes longer, then I’ll follow.’
He gave her a searching look. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Of course.’
She couldn’t see where it was that Hassan had taken Louisa and pitched her a makeshift shelter on a soft Persian rug. She desperately wanted to get away from the crowds, to find the place and to experience the silence as Louisa had done. She stood for a moment shading her eyes, looking up one of the white, dazzling paths which led away from the noisy centre of the valley. Could that have been where they went? Glancing over her shoulder she saw Ben disappearing with another queue into a tomb on the far side of the well-trodden centre of the valley. Near him she recognised one or two other people from their party. She hesitated, then, resolutely turning her back on them, she began to make her way up the empty track past a dusty fingerpost labelling yet more tombs, and, her shoes slipping on the dust and stones, she scrambled on upwards away from the crowds.
Above her the rock martins circled and swooped into holes in the cliffs but apart from that nothing moved. Almost immediately the sound of the crowds behind her diminished and disappeared. The heat and the silence were overwhelming. She stopped, staring round, scared for a moment that she might lose her bearings, but the path was clearly marked. Just empty. The colours of the rock were monochrome. Blinding. The sky the most brilliant blue she had ever seen.
Somewhere near her she heard footsteps suddenly, and the sound of scraping on the limestone. She frowned, shading her eyes as she scanned the cliff face. There was no one there. It was no more than a shifting of the sands.
But her mood had changed again and once more she began to feel uneasy. After the noise and bustle and colour of the main valley – the crowds, the shouting guides, the raised voices in a dozen different languages – this intense silence was unnerving. It was the silence of the grave.
In spite of the heat she found herself shivering again. She had the strangest feeling that she was being watched, a weird sensation that there was someone near her. She stared up at the cliff face, narrowing her eyes against the glare. There were other tombs in this direction. She had seen them on the plan. But no one seemed to be visiting them. Perhaps they were closed as the greater part of the tombs were, to protect them from the massive tourist interest. She took a few steps further up the path, rounding another corner. The cliffs were arid, silent, but for the birds. Far above she could see a dark speck against the blinding sky. Perhaps that was a kite, like the one Louisa had seen. The feeling that there was s
omeone there at her shoulder was so intense suddenly that she swung round. Tiny eddies of dust swirled momentarily round her ankles in an undetectable breath of wind, then the air was still again.
Stubbornly she moved on. It was round here that Hassan had pitched the shelter for Louisa, she was sure of it. Here they had sat together on the rug and she had opened her sketchbook and, unscrewing her water jar, had begun one of her paintings of the rugged hillside.
‘Do I gather you too prefer to be away from crowds?’
The voice, a few feet from her, shocked her out of her reverie. She spun round. Toby Hayward was standing nearby. He swung his canvas satchel off his shoulder onto the ground and wiped his face on his forearm. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. I didn’t see you until I came round the corner.’
Astonished at how relieved she was to find out the presence she had felt was that of a real person, she managed a smile. ‘I was dreaming.’
‘The right place for it.’ He stood for a moment in silence. ‘I find it hard to catch the atmosphere with the crowds down there,’ he said suddenly. ‘So many of them, and they snap endless pictures, but don’t look. Have you noticed? Their eyes are closed.’
‘The camera remembers. They are afraid they won’t,’ Anna said quietly. ‘We all do it.’ Her own camera was still in her bag.
‘I’m sure you look as well.’
The anger in his voice disturbed her. ‘I try to.’ She decided to try a different tack. Her quest, after all, was not secret. ‘I was trying to picture this place a hundred years ago, before it was commercialised.’
‘It’s always been commercialised. They probably brought guided tours here before the corpses were cold.’ Folding his arms he stared up at the cliffs. ‘Did I hear you right last night? You are a relation of Louisa Shelley?’ No apology for eavesdropping, she noticed.